Minister of Finance commends financial institutions
By VonDez Phipps
Reporter-SKNVibes.com
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Hon. Dr. Timothy Harris
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BASSETERRE, St. Kitts –Minister of Finance, Hon. Dr. Timothy Harris applauded the financial institutions on the island for organizing events to encourage fiscal prudence as a part of Financial Literacy Month observed in October .
Dr. Harris alluded to the appropriateness of the theme, ‘Manage your money... Live your dreams’ as he describes it as “very apt to the present economic situation”.
“Internationally, the focus is being placed on the most recent failures of financial institutions due to poor management of finances as people were encouraged to live beyond their means. And so, this initiative should serve to help people begin to create resources of which they need to spend some and save some for future purposes.
“People cannot continue to consume more than they can afford or they will just continue to be in more debt and, in the end, all that they would have acquired would end up not being theirs.”
Harris emphasized that the main challenge is to increase consumers’ pool of resources adding that this may be achieved through undergoing further training to “move up from scale A to scale B” and acquire some of the things that they need. He indicated it may also mean people getting two jobs, just to create more resources for themselves.
“We want this to be applied,” Harris added, “not only in Financial Literacy Month but also in every day of our lives. I think it is a very good thing that the financial institutions are engaging in. ~~Adz:Right~~
I would like to see an application of these principles in everyday work in the financial institutions, like financial counselling to put consumers in a stronger financial position. We want to ensure that we have quality consumers who are empowered to make the right decisions, and responsible actions must be made by both the institutions and the individuals.”
The Minister of Finance mentioned that as this is “the season of financial turmoil”, the message promoted by the financial institutions is pertinent to get people informed to make the right decisions. He added that financial institutions have a responsibility to give as much information as possible and “even make the fine print large and the language simplified” to accommodate all.
He stressed that “we have to be encouraged to make a great impact on people’s lives; to get people at all levels to manage money wisely or else we may be overly exposed and lose everything”.
